


the wrong end of a very long tunnel

by QuietLittleVoices



Series: The Other Side [4]
Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - The X Files, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, Sort Of, canon typical homophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-07-27
Packaged: 2019-06-17 05:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15454809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuietLittleVoices/pseuds/QuietLittleVoices
Summary: Before Sammy was an FBI Agent, he was a journalist, and before Jack was gone, he was here.[Or: The prequel].





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I would suggest you read the other fics in this series before this one, but also read this one before I post the next fic probably next week?
> 
> It will provide all the context you need for Sammy and Jack's relationship.
> 
> Title from Straw House, Straw Dog by Richard Siken.

Sammy meets Lily Wright after he’s already been working at the newspaper for a year and a half. It happens when he’s moved up to the floor of ‘real journalists’, having been given a spot as a sports journalist. Sammy really shouldn’t have accepted the position in retrospect, but it pays better than the advice column they’d had him doing (which he had been even _less_ qualified for, if that was possible).

The new job put his desk next to Lily’s, even though she leans towards political journalism. They occasionally exchange hello’s and some light conversation, but they don’t actually talk until Sammy had already been in the new position for three months.

Sammy pushes his desk phone away from him in frustration and the force of it almost destroys the cubicle wall separating his and Lily’s desks. As it was, the wall wobbled and buckled enough to make the fastener at the four-way point that connected their two cubicles to those across from them - their silent, unseen neighbours - to pop off.

Lily pokes her head around the side to look at him. “Hey, chill,” she says, though she looks more amused than annoyed. “What’s so bad in the world of sports?”

Sammy sighs and pulls the phone back to its spot. “Sorry. It’s not that, it’s - well. If I tell you something do you promise to not tell anyone?”

“I’m a journalist, so no,” she says with a roll of her eyes, “but - a journalist never reveals her sources. So go for it.”

“I hate sports.”

Lily’s laugh comes as if it’s been startled out of her. “Are you serious?”

“Deadly,” Sammy replies with a blank expression on his face. “I can’t even remember what our basketball teams’ name is. Do we even have one? I don’t know.”

“This is great - you made my day,” Lily announces. She takes a second to compose herself. “But seriously, word of advice? Request a transfer.”

Sammy leans back in the desk chair, hearing the spine of it groan under his weight and righting himself. He almost broke the cubicle - he can’t risk breaking more office equipment. He lowers his voice a little, conspiratorially. “This is secret, for real, but I’ve applied to a different job.”

“To another newspaper?” Lily asks, her interests clearly piqued.

“No, uh - government, actually,” he admits.

She raises an eyebrow. “What branch?”

“Department of Justice.”

Her eyebrow raises impossibly farther. “If you can’t tell me, that’s fine. But, just so you know, my brother works in the FBI.”

“Is that a threat?” Sammy asks jokingly, and desperately hopes that it isn’t. He’d heard enough about Lily Wright to be afraid of what she was capable of on her own; he doesn’t need the fear of an equally capable sibling on top of that.

“Actually,” she says, “he’s really into sports - he plays rugby on the weekend sometimes, but he’s always watched other stuff. I could give you his email to talk about - sports, or job opportunities, or whatever?” she offers, keeping her tone purposefully nonchalant.

Sammy feels himself becoming confused by the direction the conversation is turning. “Sure?” he answers. “I mean, yeah. I don’t really know anyone who’s ‘in the know’ about sports other than the other people who work here on it. And I don’t really... fit in well with them.”

“I could tell.” Lily slides her chair back into her cubicle and then reamerges a moment later with a post-it note. “Here. His name’s Jack; I’ll let him know to expect you, but tell him I gave you the address in the first email or he’ll delete it and block you without waiting.”

Sammy takes the note and looks down at Lily’s precise script. “Thanks,” he says lamely. “I’ll email him after work.”

Lily nods to herself and disappears back into her cubicle. Sammy barely spares a moment to try and understand anything about Lily and her motives for doing the things she did, taking one last look at the note before sticking it to the corner of his computer and going back to try and decipher sport statistics.

 

Sammy agonizes for longer than he wants to admit, composing his email to Lily’s brother. He types and re-types the greeting alone five separate times, going between different levels of formality. In the end, he settles on ‘simple’.

_Hi Jack,_

_Lily gave me your email. She said you know a thing or two about sports, and could lend me a hand._

_Let me know if we can meet up?_

_Sammy_

He hits send before he can convince himself it’s a bad idea. There was no reason for Lily to give him a fake email that he never even asked for, but there was also no reason for her to have given him her real brothers’ email. He isn’t sure what her motives were in doing it, and he doubts that she had none. Because for as little as he personally knows about Lily, he’s aware of her reputation, and she doesn’t do things without a reason.

Sammy decides to make himself dinner, and when he gets back to his desk is surprised to see that Jack had already emailed him back - almost immediately.

 _Hey, Sammy_ , the email starts. _Lily said you might contact me!_

They schedule a time, later on in the week, to meet up for drinks. Throughout their exchange, Sammy doesn’t bring up his job application, because he isn’t sure if Lily was kidding and he doesn’t even know if he’ll get the spot.

 

For the next three days, Sammy and Jack email near-constantly. Sammy isn’t normally one to log into his personal accounts at work, but he does that week - after thoroughly checking the surroundings for any upper-management. Lily gave him a _knowing_ look more than once, and he chooses to ignore it rather than dissect what it might mean. It wouldn’t be surprising if Jack told her that he and Sammy were talking, but Sammy can’t be sure _what_ , exactly, she might have been told.

Finally, the day came when Sammy was going to go get drinks with Jack to talk about rugby, or sports, or something. Sammy’s no longer sure exactly what the guise of their meeting would be. He gets one last message from Jack with the name of the pub and a _See you later!_ sign-off before he gathers his things to clock out of work.

The pub that Jack had chosen wasn’t too far from the newspaper’s office, which Sammy shouldn’t be surprised by because of course Jack knew what was in the area - his sister had worked there for several years before Sammy. He spots Jack almost immediately when he sets foot in the pub and almost turns on his heel and runs away. His brain stutters to a stop and he feels more nervous than he expected but then Lily is waving him over and he has to cross the crowded restaurant to get with them.

“Hi Lily,” he says with a nod. “Jack.” He tries not to avoid looking at Jack but -

“Hey, Sammy,” Jack says, and his smile is big and genuine and directly entirely at Sammy.

Sammy looks at Lily who’s giving him that _knowing_ look again, and he really doesn’t want to know what she knows, or what she thinks she knows. The idea of it makes him want to take off running into the street and never come back, but instead he takes a breath and pushes everything down into a little box that he keeps locked up in the back of his mind. Metaphorically covered in caution tape and a padlock.

He smiles back at Jack. “Hey,” he repeats. He clears his throat and sits down across from the siblings. “How are you both doing?”

“Well, I’m great,” Lily says after a beat, and there’s something in her tone that Sammy can’t quite place. “But I have to get going. Early flight out tomorrow.” She puts her hand on Jack’s shoulder and holds still until he looks at her and sees the _look_ she’s giving him. He just rolls his eyes at her. She shakes her head and is back in the moment. “Bye!” she says quickly, and makes her way out of the pub.

“What was that about?” Sammy asks despite himself.

Jack looks away from him a little, bashful but not blushing. “I don’t want you to feel weird about this,” he starts, which is a horrible way to start any sentence and has Sammy immediately feeling weird, “but I had a break-up about two months ago? And Lily thinks I haven’t been putting myself ‘out there’ enough.” He rolls his eyes and makes air quotes with his fingers. Sammy’s lungs tighten and he takes a deep breath. “Not that it’s _any_ of her business. I’m not really ready to date, anyway, but - I want to be friends, and help you with figuring out sports.” Jack’s tone at the end is light and teasing, and he smiles at Sammy again.

“Oh,” he says, and feels stupid for it. “Well, there’s a lot of help needed in that department.”

Jack laughs and the discomfort dissipates but the tightness in Sammy’s chest remains. “Where should we start?” he asks.

“The beginning?” Sammy suggests with a laugh. “What’s rugby, just to start. Because I’ve heard of it but I’ve never watched a game, if they’re even called that.”

Jack covers his face with his hands and Sammy worries that he’s admitted something too much but then he realizes that Jack’s shoulders are shaking in laughter. “Oh, God, okay - sure. Let’s start there,” he says, and he looks up at Sammy and grins. And Sammy feels all the air go out of his chest.

 

Lily is gone for two weeks to research her next article. Sammy and Jack correspond constantly during that time and meet up almost every other day. Jack invites Sammy over to his apartment to show him recorded rugby games as well as other sports, and by the time three months have gone by they’re nearly inseparable.

Which makes it so much harder when Jack doesn’t reply to his emails for three days.

Lily doesn’t mention anything at work, not that Sammy expects her to. Maybe she doesn’t even know - maybe she knows and doesn’t care. Maybe Sammy is overreacting and there is nothing _to_ know or care about.

It takes him another day to pull together all the courage he needs to just _ask_ Lily, and he can’t even make himself do it until after noon.

“How’s Jack?” he asks, hoping for an idyl tone and landing somewhere on the side of ‘too serious’.

Sammy doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to the way Lily looks at him like she’s got him pinned down and can see right through to his insides. “He’s fine. You talk to him more than I do,” she replies, but Sammy can see the gears turning in her head. With Lily, every word he says is another piece of the puzzle that he’s handing to her and if he isn’t careful then she’ll figure him out much faster than he’d like. If Sammy had his way, she would never figure him out.

He doesn’t want to tell her the truth and seem more concerned than he should be, but he doesn’t know how much that is. “He’s gone… off the grid,” he says finally.

Lily nods like this has given her complete understanding. “He has a project,” she explains. “He forgets everything else when he’s got his focus directed. He’ll come to his senses in a few days and apologize and then in six months he’ll do it again. It’s just how he is.”

“Oh,” Sammy says, and he doesn’t really know how to follow it up.

Lily gives him a sympathetic look. “It’s not about you,” she says, and it’s more kind that Sammy has ever seen her be. The moment is gone in a blink, though, and she looks away from him. “I have to finish this article by two,” she says as a goodbye.

Sammy stays with his chair slid out into the hallway for a moment before returning to his desk. He wants to email or call Jack but he isn’t sure that Jack will check or pick up, after what Lily said. So he doesn’t, because he feels slightly embarrassed about the three emails he did send over the last few days, but he does think of something.

 

Sammy wants to turn around and leave, go back to his car and drive back to his apartment and act like nothing ever happened. But he doesn’t. He takes a deep breath, shifts his hold of the bag of take-out onto one arm, and knocks on Jack’s apartment door.

The silence goes on almost long enough that Sammy debates either knocking again or leaving, but then Jack opens the door and Jack looks -

Jack looks like hell. His eyes are a little glassy and unfocused, his shoulders slumped a little making him seem shorter and smaller than Sammy, and he’s wearing an old t-shirt with a stain on it that looks like it’s been slept in. Sammy’s never seen Jack look so… unkempt. It isn’t that Jack dresses up when they hang out, but he’s normally clean and present and his clothes match on at least some level. It feels weirdly intimate to see him so thoroughly disheveled.

“Hey,” Sammy says, and Jack blinks twice, slowly, and his eyes start to focus on Sammy’s face.

“Hi,” he replies tiredly, and a small smile starts to play at the corners of his mouth.

Sammy holds up the bag in his hands. “I brought food. I hope you haven’t eaten yet.”

Jack looks down at the bag like it’s surprised him. “I… what day is it?” he asks.

“Thursday.”

“I haven’t eaten since… a while,” Jack admits, looking slightly embarrassed.

Sammy smiles at him softly. “Then let me in.”

Jack moves to the side and Sammy finds his own way to the kitchen, taking out bowls and plates and cutlery and transferring the curry and rice into various dishes. They eat quietly at Jack’s kitchen table, and Sammy is content to continue in that way - trying to watch Jack surreptitiously to make sure that Jack eats enough - but Jack speaks up.

“I’m sorry,” he says, not making eye contact across the table.

“For what?”

Jack sighs and pushes the last of his rice around the plate awkwardly. “I never emailed you back, did I?”

Sammy bites his lip. “You didn’t,” he confirms. “It’s okay, though.”

“It’s not.” Jack shakes his head. “We’re friends. You’re probably my best friend,” he says, and Sammy feels something unnamable twist in his stomach. It isn’t good or bad but it isn’t something that Sammy wants to spend time identifying. “I should have explained, before this happened, that I can get… distracted. We don’t really talk about my job much, and I don’t know how much you know about it from Lily, but essentially I’m a field researcher,” he explains. “I work really weird and unusual cases, ones that don’t have easy answers and sometimes don’t have answers at all. And I can get really sucked into them, sort of… obsessed. I can forget that I need to… be a person, sometimes. If I made you upset, I want to know, because I don’t want to do that.”

Sammy has the urge to reach over and touch Jack, but he doesn’t. “I was… worried,” he admits. “About you. And if you… maybe, possibly, hated me.”

“I could never,” Jack says quickly, and he drops his fork and reaches across the table to put his hand on Sammy’s wrist. “I need you to know it wasn’t about not wanting to talk to you or anything like that - I always want to talk to you. I just forget myself. I’m sorry.”

Sammy wants to say _it’s okay_ but that felt like the wrong thing. “I accept your apology,” he says lamely instead.

Jack takes his hand back and Sammy feels the absence keenly and has to resist the urge to rub at the spot. “Thank you,” he replies and he looks at Sammy in a way that makes Sammy have to look back down at the table.

“I got in,” he says quickly, trying to change the subject quickly to something a little less emotionally-based. “I just found out two days ago, I was gonna tell you.”

When Sammy looks back up, Jack looks confused. “Got in where?” he asks.

“Lily never told you?” Jack shakes his head and Sammy can’t help but sigh. “I applied to the FBI before we met. And I got in. I start training in the fall.”

Jack tips his head back and laughs, and Sammy is wildly happy to see Jack coming back into himself after how he had looked when Sammy arrived. “Of course she never told me,” he says. “That’s amazing, Sammy. I’m really proud of you.”

Sammy smiles back at him and feels something glowing inside his chest.

 

Things go back to normal after that. Sammy and Jack talk all the time and are over at each others apartments more often than not - there’s a rhythm to it, a predictability. A month before Sammy is scheduled to start the FBI training program, Jack gets sucked into another one of his projects, and Sammy buys him groceries and spends two nights on his couch. When Jack comes back to himself, he’s embarrassed and apologetic and thankful.

Training, when it starts, is physically and mentally exhausting. He falls into it, his days becoming a blur of the physical and academic courses, and it’s been two weeks before he realizes he hasn’t contacted anyone outside of the dormitory where all the recruits were put up. Sammy is ashamed to admit that he only realized how inside his own sphere he was when he saw Jack walking past the door to the classroom… and then walking in the other direction, repeated twice over before the lecture finished and Sammy jumped out of his seat.

Jack looks good in a suit with his hair carefully combed into place, and he beams at Sammy and claps a hand on his shoulder. “Looking good, there, recruit,” he says cheerfully. “I was getting worried you were…” he trails off, his tone a twinge more serious.

Sammy presses his lips together. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to -” he waves his hand in a vague gesture.

Jack nods. “I get it - I did this, too, you know. Not that long ago,” he says with a laugh. “Just - you can call me, okay? For anything.”

“I know, I will,” Sammy confirms. “I just - you might have to remind me?”

“Of course,” Jack says. “If you leave me hanging, I’ll just come by again.”

Sammy smiles at him. “I mean - I wouldn’t hate that. But I’ll try to remember to call.”

Jack claps his shoulder one more time. “I have to go, now, though.” He gives Sammy an appreciative up-and-down look that leaves Sammy feeling the heat rise to his face and his palms go clammy. “You really do look good, though.” He turns to walk away before Sammy can say anything, so Sammy just turns in the opposite direction, unsure exactly where he’s headed.

Sammy calls Jack that night, and every night after, and sees him in person for at least ten minutes every week until it’s over, and then it’s over and Jack and Lily both attend the graduation ceremony. They’re the only people in Sammy’s cheering section, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. He had thought to email his parents, had even mailed them an invitation just in case, but they hadn’t replied to either. He isn’t surprised or disappointed.

He finds Jack and Lily in the thrum of families celebrating and gets a brief hug from Lily that surprises him, but is even more surprised when Jack thrusts a modest bouquet of flowers at him. “They’re from both of us,” he says quickly, and Sammy barely catches the exasperated expression on Lily’s face before Jack is pulling him into a crushing hug. “I’m so proud of you,” Jack says, voice so low that the only reason Sammy can hear him over the crowd is because of how close Jacks’ mouth is to the side of his head.

 

Sammy is sent to work at the Denver field office. He packs up his apartment but he can’t break the lease so he finds independent renters so that he can at least break even on having to find a place to live in Colorado.

Jack throws him a going-away party and aside from Sammy, the ‘guest of honour’ as Jack keeps insisting on calling him, only Lily attends. Jack walks Sammy to his car the next morning so Sammy can set out on his roadtrip to his new position.

“Call me when you stop tonight,” Jack insists. “And… whenever you want. The time difference isn’t that bad, so we don’t have to worry about that too much and you can just call whenever.”

“You can call me, too,” Sammy reminds him. “We can visit during Easter, that’s only three months away.”

Jack nods but there’s a discontented twist to his mouth. “Yeah,” he agrees, and Sammy wishes he knew what to do to cheer Jack up but he doesn’t so he just reaches and wraps his arms around him. He feels Jack press his face against Sammy’s shoulder and is keenly aware of their two-inch height difference with his own nose mashed against Jack’s shoulder. “I’m just gonna miss you,” Jack says quietly.

Sammy takes a deep, steadying breath and nods. “Me, too,” he replies. “I’m gonna miss you, too.” They stand like that for a long while before they pull apart, and Sammy pretends not to see Jack wiping his eyes. “I’ll be back before you know it,” he says, smiling at Jack.

Jack smiles back. “Sure. Be safe, and have fun out there, okay?”

Sammy gets into his car. “See you later, Jack,” he says. He closes the door and drives down the street, and he can see Jack waving at him until he turns the corner. He wipes his eyes and pretends he’s just tired.

He stops in a motel in Illinois and calls Jack. He doesn’t have anything to say - there isn’t anything interesting in narrating fields of wheat and what looked like the same few towns repeated over and over again. Jack tells him about Lily being hungover and stopping by their collective favourite coffee shop and work, and before Sammy knows it he’s falling asleep with the phone next to him.

 

Sammy arrives at the apartment he’d bought remotely through a real estate agent and collapses on his mattress on the floor without unpacking a single thing. He calls Jack, who makes fun of him for falling asleep the night before, and then falls asleep again.

He talks to Jack again in the morning and accepts the ribbing that he deserves, barely bothering to defend himself as he sets to unpacking pieces of his apartment. He doesn’t bother with little things, focusing on the necessities. He knows he’ll have time to deal with the details later.

Sammy’s first day actually working for the FBI in the Denver field office is uneventful. He’s assigned a partner, Agent Greg Frickard, a gangly man slightly older than Sammy and prematurely balding.

As it turns out, starting off in the FBI is a lot more busy-work than Sammy had suspected. He runs papers, does some requested research, but isn’t sent into the field. He calls Jack every night and listens to Jack talk about his latest project.

“I’m glad you even picked up,” he says when Jack admits he may have forgotten dinner.

“I promised,” Jack replies, voice suddenly going soft. “It’s not like you’re here to barge in on me anymore - I have to let you, somehow.”

Jack always asks him how it’s going in Denver and Sammy always says _it’s fine_ and changes the subject to asking what Lily is working on, or any details of the case Jack himself is working on. Jack always takes the bait and doesn’t circle back around, as if he can sense even from halfway across the country that Sammy desperately doesn’t want to talk about it. Because if he talks about it then he has to admit that he’s bored out of his mind and starting to think _maybe I made the wrong choice_.

Frickard asks him a few times to join him at a bar he frequents, and after a few weeks Sammy relents and regrets it immediately. He had always given off a weird energy that had set Sammy on edge - he was a little rude, a little pushy, a little bit too unaware of his own self. But it was put on display in the crowded bar setting.

Sammy nurses his beer silently, having found a quiet corner after watching Frickard strike out with three different women. Frickard doesn’t take no for an answer, it seems, until a bigger man than he approaches. Luckily the bartender that night was big enough to scare him off. It’s another hour before Frickard throws himself dramatically in the chair next to Sammy.

“What’s your deal?” Frickard asks.

Sammy shrugs awkwardly, taking a sip of his beer to put off answering for another second. “Not really into bar hook-ups,” he answers.

Frickard rolls his eyes. “Your girl back in DC isn’t gonna know,” he says, and Sammy can hear Lily’s voice screaming at Frickard in his head but he clamps down on it. He’s only known Frickard for just over a month, but he might have to work with him for a _long_ while and he has to deal with it. “Whatever,” he mutters, and pushes off again into the thrum of the bar.

Sammy hands the bartender a few bills for his tab and walks out into the fresh night air. The coldness on his face is both sobering and intoxicating - his limbs feel less heavy with the weight of the beers he’d had but his head feels more fuzzy. He calls a cab and heads back to his apartment where he lays down on his bed and calls Jack.

“‘Lo?” Jack greets him tiredly. “Who is this?”

Sammy doesn’t say anything right away, just listening to Jack’s voice. “Hey,” he says after a few seconds, suddenly unsure as to why he called Jack at all. It was only a two hour time difference, but it was just past midnight for Sammy which meant it was even worse for Jack.

“Hey, Sammy,” Jack says, voice still tired and slow but more alert now. “Why are you calling?”

“Thought you said I could call anytime,” Sammy replies, and the lighthearted tone he’d meant to use gets lost somewhere in his chest and he sounds… he sounds far more alone than he’d meant to.

“Of course you can,” Jack says quickly. “I picked up, didn’t I? I just thought - is something wrong?”

Sammy feels a laugh bubble up in his chest and he can’t help the way it comes out, just a little too raw. He gains control of himself and the silence settles between them.

“Sammy?” Jack asks again. “You know you can talk to me about anything.”

Sammy takes a deep breath in through his nose and lets it out through his mouth. “I know,” he says. And then, before he can stop himself, the words tumbling out of him like they’re racing to be given voice. “I miss you.”

“I miss you, too,” Jack replies, and his tone is much more sad than Sammy had expected. But maybe he’s imagining it - Jack’s tired, and he’s tipsy.

He hangs up before he can make a mistake.

 

Sammy’s been in Denver for three months. Three months of Frickard asking him to bars and then _not_ asking him and instead insinuating things about what must be waiting for him back in DC. Three months of calling Jack on the phone every night. Three months of waiting for an email to pop up in his inbox telling him they made a terrible mistake.

Sammy’s been in Denver for three months when Jack walks into the field office.

He can’t stop himself from gaping in shock when Jack walks in, looking cool and composed as ever and talking to the head agent. He’s not looking at Sammy, hasn’t spotted him yet, and Sammy’s heart feels like it’s about to beat right out of his chest.

And then Jack looks over and sees him and the biggest grin breaks on his face, and he’s quickly excusing himself from the conversation and walking over to Sammy’s desk.

“Hello, Agent Stevens,” Jack says, voice all joking professionalism.

Sammy doesn’t bother with it. He stands up and hugs Jack tight, not caring that they’re in the middle of the office and everyone is looking at them. _There’s nothing to see_ , he reminds himself when Jack hugs him back.

“What are you doing here?” Sammy asks when they pull away, sooner than he’d like.

“I’m working,” Jack answers simply and, yes, obviously. Obviously he was working - that’s the only reason he’d be here. Seeing Sammy is a bonus.

“You probably need to get back to it, then.” Sammy moves just a fraction farther away so that no part of him is touching Jack and he tries not to read into the expression that passes over Jack’s face.

Jack nods. “Yeah, I do. But -”

“Stay at my apartment?” Sammy asks quickly and quietly, lowering his voice so no one can hear them.

Jack smiles at him. “Of course. I’ll call you when I’m on my way over. I’ll see you then.”

Sammy echoes his goodbye and sits back down.

“Who was that?” Frickard asks, leaning over his desk behind Sammy and startling him.

Sammy shakes his head, forcing himself back into work-mode. “Agent Jack Wright,” he answers. “My best friend.”

It’s obvious that Frickard doesn’t like that answer because he leans back and ignores Sammy until it’s time to go. Sammy isn’t sure what Frickard was looking for, but he knows he doesn’t want to give it to him.

When he gets back to his apartment the emptiness feels so much deeper now that he’s seen Jack, touched him, in this city. He can see boxes still stacked up in corners, bare shelves, his cabinets only half full, and he wants to do something about it. Sammy wants to make the small rooms more inviting, more presentable for Jack - wants to put on his best face and be strong and show that he’s really doing alright. And then Jack calls with a ten minute warning and Sammy doesn’t have time so he just changes out of his suit and into jeans and t-shirt.

Jack has his arms around Sammy again as soon as he’s through the door. His hands are moving on Sammy’s back, slowly up and down with his breathing. Sammy just fists his hands in Jack’s shirt as the tips of Jack’s fingers trail up and touch the base of his neck before trailing back to his shoulders.

“I’ve missed you so fucking much,” Jack breathes into Sammy’s shoulder.

Sammy’s throat is too tight to speak so he just nods and squeezes his arms tighter, feeling the broadness of Jack’s shoulders under his arms and trying to remember it for later.

 

Jack stays in Denver for three days. They both have to work during the day, but at night Jack comes back to Sammy’s apartment and they watch movies together and get take out and fall asleep on the couch because neither of them wants to get up and move away.

Spring drags into Summer and before Sammy knows it it’s mid-August and he’s been in Colorado for almost six months. There’s only a few weeks before his one-year anniversary of starting the training program when he gets the email.

_Your transfer has been requested by Agent Jack Wright to work on the continued research of the X-Files._

There was a number to call but Sammy ignored it. He shut the window and went outside, rounding the corner of the building to get away from the smokers area before calling Jack.

“What the fuck did you do, Jack?” Sammy bites out as soon as the line clicks, not even waiting.

There’s silence for a few seconds and then Jack says hesitantly, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You sure as fuck do. You requested my _transfer_?”

“Oh! That went through?” Jack asks, clearly happy at the news but his tone still reserved and cautious because of Sammy’s obvious anger. “How is that a bad thing?”

Sammy sighs in frustration and puts his free hand against the brick wall, feeling the texture of it beneath his palm to steady himself. “You can’t just…” he lets out a breath and leans forwards, pressing his forehead against the wall now and closing his eyes. “You’re using your influence to manipulate my career. I’m not earning this.”

Jack doesn’t say anything immediately. “You hate it there, Sammy,” he says softly. “You won’t tell me and I hate that you feel like you can’t trust me with it, but I can tell.”

“That doesn’t make it better,” Sammy mutters.

“You don’t have to accept the transfer, okay? I won’t blame you if you don’t,” Jack says. “But you _earned_ this, okay? I just requested it, I didn’t approve it. That was the director.”

Sammy doesn’t say anything but he doesn’t hang up, either.

“Just think about it,” Jack says. “Goodbye, Sammy. I miss you.”

“I miss you, too,” Sammy replies softly, and he doesn’t move until he hears the line go dead.

He takes a deep breath and goes back around the building.

“Lover’s quarrel?” Frickard asks from the smokers’ bench, startling Sammy.

“What?”

Frickard rolls his eyes and takes a drag on his cigarette. “You weren’t exactly quiet.”

Sammy sighs. “I don’t have a ‘girl back in DC’ - I already told you. Whatever you think you heard - that wasn’t anything.”

Frickard raises an eyebrow at him incredulously. “Really? Because it sounded like you were having a fight with your _boyfriend_ , Jack-”

“Shut the fuck up,” Sammy says coldly, moving forwards to stand in Frickards' space. He towers over him when Frickard is seated like this. “Keep his name out of your mouth - you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” He doesn’t wait for a response, marching inside and making a decision as he sits back down at his desk.


	2. Chapter 2

He doesn’t call Jack that night, doesn’t know what he would say to him if he did. Sammy half-wishes that Jack will call him instead, but Jack seems to be giving him space. He appreciates the gesture as much as he resents the reality of it.

He doesn’t call Jack for the next two days, either. And then he finds himself getting off an elevator in a cool basement on a late August morning, and he knocks at the door with the placard _Jack Wright_ affixed next to it.

“Come in,” Jack says from his desk without looking up. He looks haggard, but not in the way he does when he gets obsessed with projects. Tired but not distracted - like he’s _trying_ to distract himself with work and failing.

Sammy doesn’t know what to say. He thinks it should be something clever, something pithy and memorable, but in the end he waits too long and Jack looks up.

Jack makes a surprised noise and smiles, and before Sammy knows it Jack is barrelling into him. “I’m so sorry,” he says. And he keeps repeating himself over and over into Sammy’s hair as they sway slightly from the force of the impact. “I should have asked,” he says. “You were right to be mad at me. I wasn’t thinking, I was just - _God_ , Sammy, do you know how much I’ve missed you?” Jack pulls back a little to look Sammy in the eye, and there’s an expression that Sammy can’t or doesn’t want to understand there.

Sammy smiles at him but it’s weak and wobbly. “A lot, if it’s half as much as I’ve missed you,” he replies. “I should have thought about it - I would have understood if I did. As soon as you hung up I knew I was wrong. I just -”

“It’s fine, Sammy, I’m sorry,” Jack says, finally letting Sammy go but not backing away far. “So, are you ready to join me on the X-Files?” he asks, weakly trying to transition into a more professional conversation since it was still a weekday morning.

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

Jack excitedly leads him to his desk. “I know I haven’t been really… open about the nature of my work,” Jack admits. “And it wasn’t - it wasn’t deliberate, I never wanted to lie to you.”

Sammy suddenly feels the excitement from before start to fade away and be replaced by apprehension. “What do you mean?”

Jack licks his lips and pulls out a folder. He flips it open to reveal a newspaper clipping with a headline that reads _Teen Taken From Tent by Aliens!_ Sammy picks it up and reads it quickly. “I look into… the strange and unusual,” Jack explains, flipping the clipping over to show another. _Two Found Dead in Alaskan Research Base_ . Another. _Miracle Man Makes it Rain on Community Plagued by Drought._ Another. _Thirty Loggers Vanish Without a Trace in National Forest_.

“The first one,” Sammy says, pulling it back from the bottom of the pile. “Aliens? Do you…?”

“Yes.” Jack nods to the poster behind his desk that reads _I Want to Believe_ in block letters under a UFO. “I - I believe in this, Sammy. It’s why I didn’t tell you before.”

Sammy flips through the articles again and their attached case files. “You have to realize I can’t believe this,” Sammy says. “I can’t make that leap.”

“That’s okay - that’s better, actually. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I can get carried away.” Jack smiles self-deprecatingly at him. “You can keep me on the right path.”

Sammy smiles back. “You know what? I have.” He fans out the newspaper articles. “These are all older - what are you working on right now?”

“What are _we_ working on,” Jack corrects, grinning at him as he grabs a folder from under the desk. “A man in Montana, about to stand trial for murder, but claims he killed a werewolf.”

Sammy takes a deep breath and flips open the folder.

 

Jack is more nervous than Sammy has ever seen him when they step off the plane in Montana. From the evidence they had, Jack was inclined to believe the man’s claims, and Sammy had already expressed his reticence for it. He knows that unless they can unequivocally prove _werewolves exist_ , then whatever jury is found will convict this man on some charge. The only variable in question from Sammy’s perspective was if it was first degree murder or some lesser charge.

It happens all of a sudden on a straight stretch of road, shaded by trees, as they’re about to enter to town. The car dies. Sammy and Jack are both thrown forwards with the impact of the car on itself, but luckily they are mostly alone on the road and the only person coming up behind them is far enough behind that they get around the stopped car easily.

“What just happened?” Sammy asks, looking at the dead dashboard.

Jack blinks in confusion and then he rips off his seatbelt and leans into the backseat, pulling out a can of spray paint.

“What are you _doing_?” Sammy takes off his own seatbelt and gets out of the car to see Jack paint a big X on the road right behind where they were stopped. “That’s gonna be gone in three hours, at most.”

Jack shrugs and admires his handiwork. “Hopefully it lasts a little longer than that, but - it’s probably nothing, anyway.”

Sammy resists rolling his eyes. “I know you wouldn’t do it if you really thought it was nothing.”

“Then let’s call it a personal hunch,” Jack says. He opens the back door of the car and puts the paint can back in his bag.

“How’d you get that through security anyway?” Sammy asks as they both get back into the front seat of the car.

“It’s under the size limit.” Jack turned the key and the car didn’t start. It didn’t react at all. “Well fuck,” he mutters. “I don’t know anything about cars. You?”

Sammy looks at him incredulously. “What do you think?”

“Figured as much, yeah.” Jack sighs and pulls out his phone. “No signal, either.”

Sammy leans his head back. “Are we gonna have to hitchhike?”

“That’s… a good idea, actually.” Jack gets out of the car again and grabs his bag. “Let’s go wait.”

They can’t move the car off the road, but luckily they had been in the right-hand lane of two, so there was room to pass it. It takes another half hour for a car to pass them, and a trucker who introduces himself as Finn picks them up. He’s chatty and pleasant the whole way into town, and drops them off at their motel when they mention where they’re staying.

Jack finally gets on the phone with the rental agency and explains the situation, and they agree to send over a new car after some haggling on Jack’s end. But since it’s already night time, they won’t send it until the morning, so Sammy and Jack have no choice but to rest.

“How’s your first real case going so far?” Jack asks with a laugh, and he sits down heavily on the end of one of the beds. He looks disappointed, so Sammy sits next to him and bumps their shoulders together.

“More interesting than what I _was_ doing,” he answers reassuringly. Jack looks up at him and smiles and like always, he feels something catch just a little in his chest. He pushes it down and smiles back.

Three days later, they’re leaving Montana in their second rental car, and it dies while leaving town. Sammy and Jack look at each other and laugh, and when they get out of the car Sammy can see the X that Jack had painted across the road, on the same line as the car was now.

“How’d you know?” he asks, taking his bag out of the back of the car.

Jack shrugs. “I told you. It was a hunch.”

Sammy isn’t sure what that means, really, or if Jack had a bigger reason for what he’d done, but he didn’t mind. He can’t help but smile as he watches Jack try to charm someone into giving them a lift, at least into a zone with cell service.

When Jack waves him over, Sammy goes to him.

 

Being partners with Jack changes how Sammy views his projects. The details that Sammy had gotten before were vague, if Jack told him anything about them at all. Now, though, Jack shares his research with Sammy, and Sammy provides a grounding influence when he can explain some of the things that Jack finds through a more natural lense.

He thinks that he’s helping Jack, letting him bounce ideas off of Sammy and discuss the intricacies of it, until they get drinks with Lily a few months after Sammy’s returned to DC.

“You’re enabling him,” she says as soon as Jack leaves the table to go to the bar or the bathroom - Sammy didn’t hear.

Sammy sets down his drink. “How? I got him out here in the middle of an obsession.”

Lily looks at him sadly. “Do you not realize that he’d do anything for you? You ask and he’ll do it, so with you essentially _asking him_ to work on the project, _asking him_ to let you help him - you’re making him get more deep into it then he might have.”

“It’s not like that,” Sammy argues, and he hopes that the darkness of the restaurant hides the heat he can feel in his face. “He slept through the night, he’s eating - what’s the problem with having a project if he’s taking care of himself?”

“He _isn’t_ taking care of himself, Sammy,” she says, voice harsh but quiet. “ _You’re_ taking care of him.”

Sammy taps his fingers on the tabletop awkwardly. “Is that such a bad thing?” he asks, but there’s a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.

Before Lily can answer, Jack gets back to the table and sits down. “What are we talking about?” he asks with a smile, and Sammy gives Lily a slightly panicked look.

“An article I’m working on,” Lily says smoothly. “I just wanted Sammy’s _journalistic opinion_.”

Jack makes a joke about Sammy’s journalism career, something to do with sports and qualifications, but Sammy isn’t listening. He can’t stop thinking about what Lily said as he watches Jack jump into an animated story about their last case. He allows himself to be pulled into the storytelling, correcting Jack and interjected when required by his narrative. When he catches Lily’s eye she’s looking at him seriously and he has to look away.

After that night, Sammy tries not to ‘enable’ Jack. He tries to shift the topic, tries to get Jack to talk about anything else, but Jack refuses to be swayed. Eventually, Jack just stops bringing up the project in front of Sammy, and because he’s so deep into it he doesn’t talk to Sammy about anything else, either. So he just doesn’t talk to Sammy, and they go to the office and work in near silence all day.

Sammy hates it. He brings take out to Jack’s apartment and talks to him about the project and Jack lights up, and then he sleeps on Jack’s couch. It might be enabling, but Sammy isn’t sure he can live with Jack ignoring him.

 

The one-year anniversary of the official start to Sammy’s FBI career passes a few months before Jack presents the first case that is apparently about aliens.

They go to North Carolina to investigate, and within two days Sammy finds himself running full tilt into a forest after a teenager. The kid knows the area better than he does, so he manages to evade Sammy until they reach a clearer. Sammy skids to a stop at the edge of it, seeing the kid in the center, and suddenly a bright, white light engulfs his vision.

And then Sammy is blinking awake.

“Are you okay?” Jack asks desperately.

Slowly, Sammy takes stock of his limbs and realizes he’s lying on his back on the forest floor, still at the edge of the clearing. “I’m fine,” he tries to say, but it comes out garbled.

Jack leans down and kisses him, but he pulls away too fast for Sammy to react. “Can you stand up?” he asks.

Sammy props himself up on his elbows. “I need a hand.”

Jack helps him. Jack puts his shoulder under Sammy’s and leverages him upright, and together they stumble out of the forest. Sammy doesn’t mention it because his head is spinning and he nearly collapses twice on their way out, and Jack is just concerned and supportive, acting like nothing happened back there. Maybe nothing happened.

 

Sammy wouldn’t say he avoids Jack when they get back to DC, but he doesn’t go out of his way to find Jack, which is basically the same thing for them. If Jack kissed him, then that _means_ something, but Jack isn’t bringing it up. And if he didn’t, then Sammy imagined it, and he doesn’t know what to do with that. He can barely look at Jack without feeling like the room is on fire for two full days.

He gets an email from Jack saying _We need to talk_ , and he talks himself down from a panic attack before going to Jack’s apartment where Jack ushers him in without a word.

They sit next to each other on the couch in silence and Sammy watches the minutes tick away on the clock.

“I’m sorry,” Jack says in a rush. “I shouldn’t have done that, I don’t - I don’t know what I was thinking.”

So it was real, but Jack regrets it. Sammy doesn’t know what to do with this third option he hadn’t foreseen. “Oh,” he says instead.

“I don’t want you to be upset with me,” Jack continues. “I know you’re straight, and I would _never_ have done anything to make you uncomfortable if I was in my right mind but I just - I was so worried, Sammy. I thought I’d lost you.”

Sammy’s brain catches on part of Jack’s sentence. “You think I’m straight?” he asks, turning to look at Jack in the face for the first time. Jack is looking back at him with an expression that Sammy can’t place that slowly morphs into realization, and Sammy can see a hopeful look in his eyes. _Fuck it_ , Sammy thinks, and he grabs the lapel of Jack’s sweater with one hand and puts his other hand on the back of Jack’s neck and he kisses him. Jack sighs into his mouth and reaches back, tangling his hand in Sammy’s shaggy hair.

They pull apart but don’t move out of each other’s personal space, leaning their foreheads together. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” Jack admits.

Sammy laughs. “I’ve wanted to do that since the day we met.”

 

Jack blurts it out when they go to a restaurant with Lily a week later. “Sammy and I are dating,” he says, and Sammy almost chokes on his food.

“Fucking _finally_ ,” Lily says with a sigh of relief.

Sammy doesn’t say anything and he notices Jack giving him a look that is almost afraid, so he smiles at him reassuringly. He doesn’t feel very good, though, and he excuses himself from the diner early.

He doesn’t know what to do with himself back at his apartment, but it isn’t long before there’s a knock on his door. Sammy opens it to reveal Jack, who looks equal parts embarrassed and apologetic.

“I probably should have waited until _after_ we talked about it before I said anything, huh?” Jack says and Sammy gives him a small smile, inviting him in. “What was it that made you upset? Me telling Lily without asking, or - or what I said?”

Sammy reaches over and takes his hand. “Just the telling without asking,” he answers. “I’m in love with you, Jack, that’s obvious to - probably more people than I’d like, and it has been for a long time. I want to be with you in whatever way we can have. But I don’t know if I can tell people.”

“Lily isn’t people,” Jack says quickly, and blushes when Sammy laughs. “I mean - she’s my sister. Is it okay that she knows?”

Sammy nods. “She’s my friend, too. Also it’s kinda too late for that.”

“Sorry,” Jack repeats.

“It’s fine. Just - can we not tell people at work, at least?” Sammy asks. “We might get seperated and I really don’t want to go back to Colorado,” he jokes, trying to lighten the mood.

Jack laughs a little. “I guess it’s a good thing we don’t really _have_ coworkers.”

“That’s settled, then,” Sammy says decisively. He leans forwards and kisses Jack softly. “What should we do now?” he asks, awkwardly coy.

Jack pretends to think about it, looking up and away from Sammy for a second while he reaches for Sammy’s hip and pulls him so that they’re standing chest to chest. “I can think of a few things,” he says, and he turns his head to kiss Sammy.

 

It takes them a year and a half to move in together - a year to decide to do it, and seven months for the lease on Jack’s apartment to end. They establish a routine - they go to work together, come home together. They get dinner with Lily once a week, unless she’s out of the country or they’re out of town. Jack finds reports of strange creatures, rashes of unexplained disappearances, the culminations of research he’s been doing on his own, and brings them to Sammy, who doesn’t dismiss them but doesn’t believe in them either. Sammy indulges Jack’s projects, makes him diner and forces him to come to bed and go to work. It’s perfect and comfortable and Sammy is the happiest he’s ever been in his life.

A month before their ninth anniversary, Jack gets a new project. It starts out like it always does. Sammy makes him food, drags him to bed, and then four days later he wakes up in the middle of the night to find Jack back in his office studying.

“Come to bed,” Sammy says softly, resting his hand on the back of Jack’s shoulders, rubbing them slowly.

Jack barely seems to realize Sammy is there, and after a few minutes Sammy sighs and goes back to bed alone.

The next day, Jack doesn’t eat the food that Sammy brings to his office and he doesn’t come to bed. There’s nothing Sammy can do for two more days, where he almost gives in and calls Lily until he hears Jack on the phone with her through the wall.

“We’re just stuck, Lily,” he’s saying, and Sammy doesn’t want to lean against the door to listen but he moves to stand closer to it. “We can’t move forwards.”

Sammy doesn’t know what Lily tells him, can’t hear from that far, and he doesn’t know what to do with what Jack said. Sammy knows he doesn’t know the context, but he can’t help but wonder.

Jack ignores Sammy when he brings food in for him that night. “Can you please eat?” Sammy begs, and Jack doesn’t look over so Sammy grabs his shoulder to force him to turn. “Jack, eat,” he says, pushing the plate on top of the papers he has scattered on his desk.

“I’m busy,” Jack replies with a scowl.

Sammy just rolls his eyes and walks away. The tension in their apartment is palpable for two days, which is when Jack shows up at breakfast with a smile on his face and Sammy can’t share it.

“What’s wrong?” Jack asks immediately, and Sammy wants to scoff but he can’t.

“Jack,” he starts slowly, tapping his fingers on the tabletop. “Do you remember when we first met?” he asks instead.

Jack smiles at the memory, and the small creases around his eyes that appear when he does that highlight the time that has passed. “Of course.”

“You said you always wanted to know if you upset me,” Sammy explains. “Because you didn’t talk to me for a few days. It was fine, because we’d just met, but - Jack, I really feel like I haven’t seen you in almost a week, and we live together.”

Jack’s face falls. “I’m - I’m so sorry, Sammy. I don’t know what it was about this case that got me so bad, but I should have realized. I should have noticed you.”

Sammy nods. “You should have, yeah.” He leans across the table and gives Jack a quick kiss. “It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean to.”

“I would never,” Jack says, leaning forward slightly into Sammy’s space. “I love you more than anything, Sammy. I sort of wanted to wait for our anniversary for this, but - I want to spend the rest of my life with you. What would you say to the idea of… getting married? Coming out, starting a family, all that.”

Sammy can’t help but lean forward and meet him in the middle. “I would say yes,” he replies, closing the distance to kiss him. “And I would say we had the same idea for an anniversary present.”

Jack laughs against his mouth.

 

They tell Lily first and she has the same reaction as she did when they first started dating. They’d been telling them both to do this for years, and thought that it was her own influence that pushed them the final step. Neither of them have it in their hearts to correct her.

The next person they tell is Reagan Spears, director for three years and probably the only person left in the FBI who thought that Sammy and Jack did good, reputable work. They both consider her a friend, and are more afraid to tell her because of it. They fill out the paperwork and bring it up to her office together and in person - they could have emailed it to HR, but that seemed impersonal.

She takes it from them and spends a long time reading it over, probably longer than she needed. “Well that explains a lot,” she says finally, looking up at them. “I guess congratulations are in order?”

“Thank you,” Jack says. “We would have told you, but -”

She shakes her head. “I understand. I’m your boss, I would have probably had to report on it.” She puts the paperwork in a pile in the corner of her desk. “If I can ask - how long?”

“We’ve been engaged for about three weeks,” Jack answers awkwardly.

“Longer than we’ve known you,” Sammy confirms for her. “Nine years, next week.”

“I did wonder why you lived together in your thirties,” Reagan says lightly, smiling at them. “I’m happy for you both.”

 

Lily and Jack fight about something in early December before Lily leaves for a long research trip. Sammy never finds out what it’s about, but he knows that they aren’t talking to each other and Lily doesn’t try to call him, either. Jack gets a new project in late December and it’s worse than it has ever been. From day one he refuses Sammy’s help. On the third day, Sammy comes home to find Jack collapsed in his office and drives him to the emergency room where they say it was a combination of dehydration, malnutrition, and exhaustion. Jack tries to discharge himself when he wakes up and yells at Sammy when he stops him.

Jack isolates himself when they let him out of the hospital, and by some stroke of luck manages to not collapse again.

On January third, Sammy wakes up and finds Jack’s office door open. Jack isn’t anywhere in the apartment, so Sammy walks down to the parking lot and finds his car running in the parking lot with a bag in the trunk.

Jack is gone, and back up in their shared apartment on his desk is a map of King Falls.

 

Sammy goes on a case alone and finds nothing, doesn’t really try. Reagan had offered him time off but he didn’t take it.

He gets the email about an hour before someone knocks on his door, three months after Jack disappeared. Two months after the police stopped actively investigating.

“Agent Stevens?” the young man asks hesitantly, peeking his head around the door. “I’m Ben Arnold, I’ve been assigned to work with you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this fic!! Please leave a comment telling me what you think I'd really appreciate it as I go into writing the final fic of the 'main' story of this series !!!!


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